


In Self, Possessing

by icarus_chained



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Character Study, Friendship, Future Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-20
Updated: 2012-05-20
Packaged: 2017-11-05 17:28:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/409087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A short fic, set in the future. Vimes and Vetinari finish the conversation they've spent years having.</p><p>No specific spoilers, but takes everything up to Unseen Academicals into account.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Self, Possessing

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt of 'Vimes, Vetinari, cuddlefic', but ... the Vetinari in my head _would not bend_. That man's self-possession is more than a little terrifying. *smiles sheepishly* So ... a different kind of connection, perhaps?
> 
> Warning: I'm far more shaky on them than I would like.

Vimes stood at the window of the Oblong Office, watching the city spread out beneath him. Tiny lights strewn across the plains, a second from conflagration, a second from darkness. Balanced precariously between the two. Kept safe, for now, from the enemies within, and without. If you decided to see it that way.

Hnh. He needed to stop listening to Vetinari. And to Carrot. The pair of them had a tendency to romanticise, at times. And how was _that_ , for a thought you’d never expect to have, on meeting either of them? Heh.

He felt, more than heard, Vetinari enter the room behind him. To be fair, you’d have had to be brain-dead not to. The man had presence, when he wasn’t trying to hide it. Havelock Vetinari had never had to do something so crass as make a _noise_ to announce himself.

And he _was_ announcing himself, now. Vimes suspected he was more than a little miffed, that someone had entered his office before him, for once. Not _surprised_ , you understand. He’d known where Vimes was at every moment since he’d entered the building. Before. But … annoyed, a little, that even knowing he knew, Vimes had dared regardless.

Warmed the cockles of his heart, that annoyance did. Cheered him right up.

“Sir Samuel,” Vetinari acknowledged mildly. Idly curious, nothing more. There was a time that would have annoyed Vimes ( _would_ have, he says, like it didn’t still), but not as much these days. He’d built up a tolerance for it, he supposed. And it was difficult to keep a temper up, with this chest. 

Which was not to say it wasn’t worth it, sometimes. Just … not now. It’d been hard enough to work up the nerve for this, without making life difficult for himself.

He didn’t answer, though. Didn’t turn, either. A taste of Vetinari’s own medicine, maybe, a taste of what it was like to wait. But maybe … something else, too. Standing silently. A watchman and an assassin, standing in the darkness, waiting. Maybe … something more.

“Can I help you, Your Grace?” Vetinari asked softly, ghosting silently up to stand beside him. Looking out at the city. His city, their city. In the shadows, in the seat of power, looking down on the sea of lights. Yes. Something more, maybe.

“Probably not,” Vimes grumbled softly. Wishing idly that he had a cigar. Not to smoke. Just to roll between his teeth. “Just … something I’ve been meaning to say, that’s all.”

Vetinari raised an eyebrow at him. A smooth, cool expression, interest and mild amusement. Vimes resisted the urge to punch him. Mostly on the grounds that it would _not_ be good for his health. He resisted that urge a lot, around this man. “Indeed, Sir Samuel?”

Vimes growled, a little. “Oh for … bloody well call me _Vimes_ , will you?” he snarled, if less forcefully than intended. “Or Sam. I’ll take Sam, at this point. Stop … bloody rubbing my nose in it, will you? You and your bloody power games …”

The quirk of Vetinari’s lip was a practically a belly-laugh from anyone else. “Old habits,” he demurred, and it bloody well was a smirk, for all it didn’t look like one. After all these years, Vimes knew what the man looked like when he was smirking, and carefully not showing it. “My apologies. Sam.”

Of course he’d pick that one. Of _course_.

“And none of your bloody cheek, either,” he growled. Just because. There was survival, and then there was _principle_.

Vetinari’s mouth twitched lightly, the eyebrow lifting another fraction. Trying to have a conversation with the damnable man was more of a workout than actual fighting with most other people, and for much the same reasons. Fighting wasn’t about attacking. It was about _knowing_ , about seeing what your opponent was about to do, seeing the little shift that meant the bastard was about to swing. 

With Vetinari, if you actually _saw_ the shift, then either it was already far, far too late, or he was _letting_ you see it. Neither of which was a comforting option.

“Why are you here, Sam?” Vetinari asked, gently. Well. Gentle for him, which mostly meant he wasn’t _actively_ smirking and/or being sardonic at you.

Vimes shifted uneasily. Not a good idea, were this actually a fight, but it wasn’t. And if it was, then he’d already lost, years since. He didn’t look at the man. Fixing his eyes instead on the city. On the spread of lights in the darkness.

“Do you remember what you told me, all those years ago? After the bit with the dragon?”

He probably could have narrowed it down a bit more, given a better description, but he figured he didn’t need to. That conversation … had defined quite a lot between them, in the years since. He figured Vetinari would know what he was talking about.

Sensing the man stiffen, minutely, beside him, it looked like he’d figured right.

“Indeed,” Vetinari said, softly. It had been years, since then. But that wasn’t a thing that faded with years. “I do indeed, Sir Samuel.”

Vimes thought briefly about quibbling over the name, but decided he wasn’t that much of a bastard. He recognised someone bracing themselves as well as anyone. Better, even, than most. And he mostly wasn’t the type to kick a man for it. Though he couldn’t quite deny the vague sense of satisfaction, despite that.

“Do you still see that?” he asked. Gruff and hushed, standing, the pair of them, alone in the darkness. Looking out over the sea of it. “Does it still look the same to you?”

A sea of evil, bad people versus bad people, and only the little rafts of rules and laws, the lanterns, to stand against it. But they couldn’t. Because, like the lights outside the window … they were part of it. The Guarding Dark.

Vetinari didn’t answer. Not immediately. Vimes could feel his silent regard, heavy against the side of his face. This wasn’t a question he could have asked, before. Wasn’t something he would have dared, or even thought of. A little, at the time. How did the man keep _getting up_ , every morning? But not this. 

And Vetinari … was silent, for a long moment, as he considered it. And gentle, in his way, as he answered it. 

“Always,” he said, and it _was_ gentle. Actually gentle, not just Vetinari gentle. “It’s not a thing that fades, Sir Samuel.” A small, vague smile, the smallest quirk of a lip. “Knowledge, once gained, does not simply slip away.”

 _Much as we might wish it to_ , would have been the unspoken rider, from anyone else. People who wanted to forget. People who would drown the world inside a bottle for twenty years, looking to deny it. Thrust a badge in the face of it, for twenty more, denying not that it existed, but that it controlled. Much as we might wish it, someone else might have said.

Not Vetinari. Never him. Knowledge was his power. Vimes had always known that. Always, in his way, appreciated it. Vetinari … didn’t flinch, from the dark parts. Didn’t pretty them up in glorious language, and pretend they weren’t real. Vimes … had always admired that, about him.

Of course, the darkness Vetinari saw was maybe an order of magnitude more than the one _he_ saw, but … That, in some ways, only made it more impressive.

“Do you ever hate them?” he asked, finally. A question far beyond the pale, now. So quiet few could have heard him, but Vetinari had been, and yet was, an assassin. He was good at the quiet, and the silence, and the things that _wished_ they were silent. “For … being that. Do you ever hate them?”

Vetinari turned to him fully, now. A small frown between his eyes, a rare glimpse of genuine concern, watching him. Wondering, maybe, if something had happened, something that had somehow managed to slip past his notice. A tiny hint of worry. It almost made Vimes smile. But, since he wasn’t _usually_ a bastard, and was a little touched despite himself, he didn’t.

“No,” Vetinari murmured. Frowning for a second more, before turning his gaze away. Towards the window, and the lights that lay beyond it. “If anything … the opposite.” He smiled faintly, looking towards Vimes as if he did not expect to be believed. Reaching out to rest one pale hand against the panes. “Ever since I first understood them. Quite … Quite the opposite, Sir Samuel.”

Vimes let his eyes crinkle, a little. A tiny smile of his own. Not quite a smirk. He’d … thought that. Yeah, he’d thought it. That was why he’d asked. And that … made it that little easier.

“Have I ever given you the impression otherwise?” Vetinari asked him, curiously. The frown alleviated, slightly, a war of expressions written in miniature, between the two of them. Vimes was rather proud, actually. It’d been a long few years coming. But guile could deepen, with age.

“You’ve given me a lot of impressions, over the years,” he grunted, glancing sideways, daring a smug response. “Don’t suppose many of them have been all that accurate.”

Vetinari smiled. Visible amusement. “In my defense, Sir Samuel,” he murmured, “that was more your doing than mine.”

“Yeah. But you weren’t at all averse to helping it along, were you?” he shot back. Testily, if mostly good-naturedly. And anyone else, the response would have been a grin. As it was, the smile was a shade broader than Vetinari’s norm. For a moment, at least. For a second.

“Why do you ask?” the man asked, low and serious. More serious than Vimes usually saw him, but then, this wasn’t their normal conversation. Even that first one, all those years ago, hadn’t been like this. Nor the subsequent ones. They had been Vetinari revealing things to _him_ , part taunt, part spur, part genuine explanation. And probably a dozen other things besides. This … This felt oddly equal.

And because it did. Because Vimes was not, completely, who he’d used to be. Because they were standing here, alone and quiet in the shadows, waiting, watching, the way maybe they’d spent their lives doing. Because it was that moment where things were almost safe, that second before you stepped out of the stillness and into action. Because this … was the moment for it, if there was ever to be one. Because of all those things. 

Vimes reached out, and touched the pale hand still spread on the panes. Slowly. Carefully. He reached out, and touched the back of Vetinari’s hand.

The stillness that flowed through the man in response was not a threat. It was not a warning. It didn’t need to be. Vetinari was, and always had been, a man whose self-possession was built on a foundation of lethality. Even now, aged and still limping, with grey and silver in that dark hair. Even still. Not that Vimes would ever had believed differently. Age did many things to you. But it never destroyed the beast. It never destroyed the thing that _knew_. 

It had taken him a while, to recognise Vetinari’s beast. So much more restrained, more _civilised_ , than his own. Vetinari’s beast but rarely showed its claws. But only, only, because Vetinari knew it so well that he could arrange matters so that it didn’t _have_ to. It wasn’t that Vetinari didn’t _have_ a beast. It was that his beast was almost not a beast anymore. Vetinari’s beast was … almost human.

It was part of what the man one of the most terrifying people Vimes had ever seen. It was also … part of why he respected him.

He lifted the man’s hand, carefully, while Vetinari watched him. While Vetinari allowed him. Turned it, under dark, appraising eyes, lifting a palm cool from the glass into the light of the city. Studying it, for a second. The raised calluses, only barely visible, but very much there. The slender, intelligent fingers. The quiet, darkly deceptive strength. He gave it the once-over, a policeman’s eye. Confirming, a little uselessly, all the things he already knew, and had known, years since. The things … he sometimes didn’t want to remember. 

And then, slowly, carefully, he pressed his own hand into it. Not a handshake. Not quite that.

And Vetinari, after a long, long moment, long enough for the warning to seep into the back of Vimes’ skull … curled his fingers closed, and held in return.

“Sir Samuel?” he asked, very quietly. Emptily, nothing showing at all. Not, Vimes thought, because Vetinari dared not. But so that nothing should taint the reasoning. So that nothing in Vetinari would influence Vimes’ response. Neutrality, carefully enforced.

“I needed to hear you say it,” Vimes said, slowly. Vetinari, looking out at all beneath him, seeing a roiling sea of evil. Looking at everyone who passed his way, and seeing every dark stain inside them. Knowing them for what they were. Seeing … what Vimes didn’t want to see. The part he hadn’t ever dared deny, because the beast was too reasoned for that, the beast was too knowing, but … the part he dared not focus on too deeply. The part sobriety laid bare before him, the part he had struggled against for so damned long. 

He’d needed to hear it. That Vetinari, who saw it too, who looked out at all those people, and saw them for the bastards they were … did not hate. That Vetinari _could_ look at them, could see them, and neither flinch, nor strike them down. That Vetinari, looking out on an endless blackness, could get up every damn morning, and _do_ something, fight for something, change something, even knowing it changed _nothing_ , and … not hate. Even _love_. Even still. 

There was hope, in that. There had to be. This city, their city, the city Vimes was leaving to his son … If even Vetinari could look out on it, seeing what he did, and think it worth fighting for, think it worth living for … then there had to be hope. In all the sea of evil. There had to be hope.

And Vetinari, watching him, seeing things in his face that Vimes wasn’t even bothering to hide … Vetinari looked at him, palm cool against Vimes’ own, and smiled. Softly, and more real than Vimes had ever seen him.

“I have never hated them, Sam,” he said, gently. “Despaired of them, perhaps, but never for long.” His eyes crinkled, lines Vimes hadn’t ever seen before webbing about them, those dark eyes bright on his. “I have always loved them,” Havelock Vetinari told him softly, and held his hand. “Even, perhaps ... some more than others.”

Vimes blinked at him, desperate, and wary, and oddly light, standing with a beast more fearsome than his own, looking out over their darkling city. “And why … why is that?” he asked, gruffly, his fingers fretting about the man’s wrist.

Havelock smiled at him. “Because,” he said, soft and precise, and with a self-possession born of lethality. “They give me hope.”

And in the end, wasn’t that the best of all reasons, to love someone?


End file.
